Bush: God told me to invade Iraq
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article317805.ece
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Most of President Bush's speech on terrorism at the National Endowment for Democracy on October 6 was rhetoric-significant for what was said and what was omitted.
http://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/cgi-bin/newsviews.cgi/Islam/2005/10/07/President_Bush_s_Sp
CHRONICLES ONLINE
News & Views, Friday, October 7, 2005
PRESIDENT BUSH'S SPEECH ON TERRORISM:
MEANING AND IMPLICATIONS
Srdja Trifkovic
President Bush's speech on terrorism at the National Endowment for Democracy on October 6 had been billed by the White House as a major policy address that would include unprecedented detail. In the end the only piece of hard news concerned his claim that ten serious al-Qaeda terrorist plots have been disrupted since 9-11, including three plots to attack targets inside the United States, and at least five more "efforts to case targets in the United States, or infiltrate operatives into our country." The rest was rhetoric, significant for what was said and what was omitted. The results give cause for serious concern. (NB: Mr. Bush's words are in * italics *)
* In this new century, freedom is once again assaulted by enemies determined to roll back generations of democratic progress. Once again, we're responding to a global campaign of fear with a global campaign of freedom. *
The parallel the President is making here is with the Cold War rather than World War II. Either way is flawed primarily because it misdiagnoses the nature of the campaign. The Cold War was waged between two clearly defined military-political alliances. Even when escalating their confrontation to dangerous levels (Berlin twice, Korea, Cuba) they played by a set of mutually recognized rules. The rationality of the adversary could be assumed, and the costs and benefits of any given course of action quantified. By contrast the conflict "in this new century" is not "a global campaign of fear" - an amorphous and inappropriate description - but a prime example of fourth-generation warfare (4GW) in which it is inherently hard to target the enemy and to evaluate results. The reason is that the enemy is something other than a military force organized and operating under the political control of a national government, that it transcends national boun
daries, and that its actual or poten!
tial fifth-columnists are present in large numbers in the target countries. The granularity, decentralized pattern of the enemy, makes counter-measures additionally difficult. There is no command and control system to disrupt among autonomous, self-motivated groups of young people, often embedded inside the target-nations.
* And once again, we will see freedom's victory. *
That victory is impossible in the sense of eliminating the phenomenon of terrorism altogether, but the "war on terrorism" can be successfully pursued to the point where America (and the rest of the West, if it follows) are made significantly safer than they are today by adopting measures - predominantly defensive measures - that would reduce the danger of such incidents to as near zero as possible. The victory will come not by conquering Mecca but by disengaging America from Mecca and by excluding Mecca from America; not by eliminating the risk but by managing it wisely, resolutely, and permanently.
* Recently our country observed the fourth anniversary of a great evil, and looked back on a great turning point in our history. We still remember a proud city covered in smoke and ashes, a fire across the Potomac, and passengers who spent their final moments on Earth fighting the enemy. *
The definition of "a great turning point" has to entail a paradigm shift in self-perception, which has not taken place in the United States after 9-11. The global strategy of the United States still suffers from two primary flaws: the quest for global hegemony that is divorced from a pragmatic notion of national interest, and the inability and/or unwillingness of the elite class to establish whether the sacred texts of Islam, its record of interaction with other societies, and the personality of its founder, Muhammad, provide the clue to the motives, ambitions and methods of modern terrorists.
* We still remember the men who rejoiced in every death, and Americans in uniform rising to duty. *
The remembrance of "the men who rejoiced" needs to include Paterson, New Jersey, and other Muslim enclaves in the Western world, with all the attendant implications for this country's immigration policy and the ideology of multiculturalism imposed by the elite class. As we have ssen with the Rushdie affair 17 years ago, even when it refrains from open rejoicing, the Muslim diaspora in the West overwhelmingly condones religiously justified acts of terrorism - which were openly advocated in Rushdie's case - that challenge the monopoly of the non-Muslim host-state on violence. The non-Muslim establishment of the host-state typically responds by trying to appease the Muslim diaspora, or else it shies away from confronting the problem by pretending that it does not exist. Mr. Bush routinely does both.
* And we remember the calling that came to us on that day, and continues to this hour: We will confront this mortal danger to all humanity. *
The notion of "the calling that came to us on that day" is messianic kitsch. His belief that "history has called America and our allies to action" was stated with equal firmness in his first State of the Union address almost four years ago. The conclusion, that he sees himself as an anointed agent of divine providence, seems inescapable and it is alarming in the extreme. The notion that one is on the right side of history is dangerous not only because it breeds irrational belief in the correctness of one's own intuitive judgment but also because it prompts megalomaniacal decisions and policies inimical to the political and constitutional tradition of the United States. The historicist fallacy that "history" is an entity on a linear march has bred gnostic ideologies that find it easy to murder those who are deemed to be on its "wrong" side. Sooner or later this mindset results in the destruction of the over-expanded, over-extended bearer of the divinel
y appointed task. To dea!
l with the terrorist threat effectively and on the basis of leadership willingly accepted by those who are led, Mr. Bush should discard the pernicious notion of his or his country's exceptionalismLast but by no means least, "this mortal danger to humanity" cannot be confronted unless the nature of the threat to America is properly diagnosed first.
* We will not tire, or rest, until the war on terror is won. *
"Winning" is impossible unless 1.3 billion Muslims are either secularized or else converted to something other than Islam. To put it crudely, "winning" means either that Muslims have been "westernized" - that is to say, made as willing as Christians to see their religion first relativized, then mocked, and its commandments misrepresented or ignored - or else Christianized, which of course cannot happen unless there is a belated, massive, and unexpected recovery of Western spiritual and moral strength.
* The images and experience of September the 11th are unique for Americans. Yet the evil of that morning has reappeared on other days, in other places -- in Mombasa, and Casablanca, and Riyadh, and Jakarta, and Istanbul, and Madrid, and Beslan, and Taba, and Netanya, and Baghdad, and elsewhere. *
This inclusion of Beslan in the list of islamist terror attacks is a welcome novelty, in view of the notorious ambiguity of the American decision-making community over Chechnya. The recognition by the President that attacks by Chechen separatists on Russian airplanes, metro stations, theaters, hospitals and schools are terrorist in character and Islamic in the method of execution was long overdue. It will be interesting to observe the reaction of the apologists for Chechen terrorism in America gathered around the American Committee for Peace in Chechnya (ACPC). They include Richard Perle, Elliott Abrams, Kenneth Adelman, Midge Decter, Frank Gaffney, Michael Ledeen, Norman Podhoretz, Joshua Muravchik, Morton Abramowitz, Richard Pipes, Robert Kagan, and William Kristol. From now on Mr. Bush should also cease offerring hospitality to top Chechen leaders who stand accused of masterminding terrorist attacks. He needs to do so because we need Russia as an ally in the global strugg
!
le against jihad
* Some call this evil Islamic radicalism; others, militant Jihadism; still others, Islamo-fascism. *
It is encouraging that Mr. Bush is moving away from the misnamed Global War on Terrorism (GWOT), with its concomitant confusion of the enemy's preferred technique with the enemy himself, and in the direction of associating the problem with the Islam-related adjectives. The "War on Terror" is hardly better: the enemy here is an emotion, a target even more elusive than the technique. Yet another misnomer, "global struggle against violent extremism" (G-SAVE) favored by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, suffers from the same defect. And President Bush's attempt in August 2004 to pinpoint the actual physical enemy bordered on the surreal: "We actually misnamed the war on terror. It ought to be the struggle against ideological extremists who do not believe in free societies who happen to use terror as a weapon to try to shake the conscience of the free world."
* Whatever it's called, this ideology is very different from the religion of Islam. This form of radicalism exploits Islam to serve a violent, political vision: the establishment, by terrorism and subversion and insurgency, of a totalitarian empire that denies all political and religious freedom. *
Mr. Bush is simply wrong. "This ideology" is immanent to Islam. While it is possible to dispute the details of al-Qaeda's theological justifications for terror, it is not possible to dispute that its arguments are based on standard Islamic sources, precedents, and methods of deduction. Those sources and principles are independent of any dubious or capricious interpretations of the Kuran or the Hadith. The jubilant Muslim masses thronging streets to celebrate 9-11 may not have known much about theology and jurisprudence, but their imams and madrassa teachers did. Even if the latter disproved of bin Laden's methods, they would be hard-pressed to reject his fundamental claim that his guidance is rooted in the orthodox Islamic scripture and tradition.
* These extremists distort the idea of jihad into a call for terrorist murder against Christians and Jews and Hindus -- and also against Muslims from other traditions, who they regard as heretics.*
Contrary to what Mr. Bush seems to be suggesting, "the idea of jihad" does call for terrorist murder against Christians and Jews and Hindus and it is a distortion of that idea to suggest otherwise. "The idea of jihad" is a highly developed doctrine, theology, and legal system of mandatory violence against non-believers. It made Islam the first political ideology, already in Muhammad's lifetime, to adopt terrorism as a systemic tool of policy, not as a temporary and unwelcome expedient.
* Many militants are part of global, borderless terrorist organizations. in places like Somalia, and the Philippines, and Pakistan, and Chechnya, and Kashmir, and Algeria.*
. and London, Madrid, Milan, Montreal, Buffalo NY, Portland OR, Lodi CA, Boca Raton FL, etc. In any group of 1,000-plus Muslim immigrants whose lives are centered on a mosque two things can be predicted with near-certainty. The first is that a sizable percentage - around a quarter - will sympathize with the motives of Al-Qaeda and its ilk, if not with their methods. The second is that some smaller percentage of that group - between one-in-ten and five percent - especially among the Western-born young, will support those methods as well, and prove willing to apply them in practice.
* First, these extremists want to end American and Western influence in the broader Middle East, because we stand for democracy and peace, and stand in the way of their ambitions. *
If the desire to end American influence in the Middle East were a defining motive for terrorism, we are in deep trouble as nine-tenths of Muslims would like to see that happen. The reason is not "because we stand for democracy and peace" but - overwhelmingly - because we are perceived as hopelessly biased in the problem of Israel-Palestine
* The terrorists regard Iraq as the central front in their war against humanity. And we must recognize Iraq as the central front in our war on terror. *
That is true, but Mr. Bush is ignoring the fact that his administration's policies have transformed Iraq into that "central front." There had been no terrorist training camps under Saddam, period.
* These radicals depend on front operations, such as corrupted charities, which direct money to terrorist activity. They're strengthened by those who aggressively fund the spread of radical, intolerant versions of Islam in unstable parts of the world. *
Both accusations are well founded, but both of them are far more applicable to America's "ally" Saudi Arabia than to either Iran or Syria.
* The militants are aided, as well, by elements of the Arab news media that incite hatred and anti-Semitism, that feed conspiracy theories and speak of a so-called American "war on Islam" -- with seldom a word about American action to protect Muslims in Afghanistan, and Bosnia, Somalia, Kosovo, Kuwait, and Iraq. *
To boast of "American actions to protect Muslims" in Bosnia and Kosovo defies belief, as if those actions were something to be proud of and as if they had not secured a resilient base for jihad in the heart of Europe.
* We didn't ask for this global struggle, but we're answering history's call with confidence, and a comprehensive strategy. *
A "comprehensive strategy" in the war against Islamic terrorism would demand disengagement of America from Islam and the exclusion of Islam from America, but that is the exact opposite of what Mr. Bush advocates. He and his national security team do not accept that in this kind of 4GW the best offense is defense. The victory will come not by eliminating the risk but by managing it wisely, resolutely, and permanently. By learning to keep her distance from the affairs of the Muslim world, and by keeping the Muslim world away from her shores, America would do a huge favor to the Muslims and, more importantly, to herself.
* Together, we've killed or captured nearly all of those directly responsible for the September the 11th attacks; as well as some of bin Laden's most senior deputies; al Qaeda managers and operatives in more than 24 countries; the mastermind of the USS Cole bombing, who was chief of al Qaeda operations in the Persian Gulf; the mastermind of the Jakarta and the first Bali bombings; a senior Zarqawi terrorist planner, who was planning attacks in Turkey; and many of al Qaeda's senior leaders in Saudi Arabia. *
In very similar terms General Westmoreland boasted of body counts in Vietnam. Many of Viet Cong's 1965-68 cadres were dead by 1970, but twice as many came into its ranks and more than made up the shortfall. In 4GW body counts are largely meaningless because this type of warfare cannot be understood, let alone conducted, in conventional military terms and with undue reliance on military force. Yes, hundreds and perhaps thousands of terrorists are behind bars or dead, and moving money around has been made more difficult, but the potential and actual human assets of the enemy, his reach and operational capability are growing. A phenomenon initially based on local groups that have acquired global reach is morphing into a global network of autonomous cells with local reach but with a global cumulative potential. Al-Qaeda and its loosely linked offshoots, or fully independent cells merely inspired by it, are fielding a second generation of operatives. What Mr. Bush is not sa
ying i!
s that many of them are Muslim immigrants and their Western-born offspring seemingly integrated into the Western society.
* Second, we're determined to deny weapons of mass destruction to outlaw regimes, and to their terrorist allies who would use them without hesitation. The United States, working with Great Britain, Pakistan, and other nations, has exposed and disrupted a major black-market operation in nuclear technology led by A.Q. Khan. *
To claim that Pakistan was a partner in this operation is ridiculous. Pakistan is a major violator of the ban on nuclear proliferation. In 2003 Dr. Khan stunned the world when he admitted on television to leaking nuclear weapons secrets to - among others - North Korea, Libya, and Iran. He claimed that he had acted "without authorization" from Gen. Musharraf's government, but he was lying. This was followed by Musharraf's point blank refusal to hand any documents to any international agency, or to allow members of the UN's Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) into Pakistan to investigate the affair. He declared that his is a sovereign country and therefore "no document will be given, no independent investigation will take place." Vowing never to roll back Pakistan's nuclear assets, Musharraf even blamed the United States for not warning him of Khan's activities in a more timely manner.
* Third, we're determined to deny radical groups the support and sanctuary of outlaw regimes. State sponsors like Syria and Iran have a long history of collaboration with terrorists, and they deserve no patience from the victims of terror. *
Instead of naming Syria and Iran for the second time, Mr. Bush should have taken a closer look at such pillars of America's anti-terror alliance as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and Turkey. He should be developing an alternative strategy to pragmatic pacts with unreliable allies. The absence of such strategy is both remarkable and baffling. It reflects the fact that this country's links with some of the least pleasant regimes on earth continue to be clouded by establishmentarian denials and the feigned optimism that have characterized Washington's relations with the "friendly" and "moderate" part of the Muslim world for decades.
* Fourth, we're determined to deny the militants control of any nation, which they would use as a home base and a launching pad for terror. For this reason, we're fighting beside our Afghan partners against remnants of the Taliban and their al Qaeda allies. For this reason, we're working with President Musharraf to oppose and isolate the militants in Pakistan. *
In the meantime Musharraf is running with the hare and hunting with the hounds. Suicide attacks in London on July 7 2005, masterminded by a young British-born Pakistani, and that country's long list of proven or suspected links with numerous other terrorist attacks in recent years, should focus attention on the ambivalent role of Pakistan and its leader in the war on terrorism. The myth of Pakistan as a staunch American ally is in need of critical scrutiny. Musharraf's government has backtracked on its promise to control the Islamic schools that are grooming new terrorists. Pakistan remains the epicenter of global jihad, a breeding ground for the new echelons of "martyrs," and it meets the criteria for a slot on the Axis of Evil. Pakistan is an enormous campus in which some ten thousand madrassas prepare over one million students for the rigors of jihad. When pressed, Musharraf announces the closure of some of the schools where "the eggs of the
snake of terrorism are incubat!
ed," only to let them re-open later. It can hardly be otherwise in a country founded on the pillars of Islamic orthodoxy.
* Some observers look at the job ahead and adopt a self- defeating pessimism. It is not justified. With every random bombing and with every funeral of a child, it becomes more clear that the extremists are not patriots, or resistance fighters -- they are murderers at war with the Iraqi people, themselves. *
That alleged clarity has not diminished their ability to recruit fighters, including suicide bombers, or to maintain the dynamics of their attacks at a level unimaginable three years ago.
* In contrast, the elected leaders of Iraq are proving to be strong and steadfast. By any standard or precedent of history, Iraq has made incredible political progress -- from tyranny, to liberation, to national elections, to the writing of a constitution, in the space of two-and-a-half years. *
The "standard or precedent of history" is not encouraging in Iraq when compared and contrasted to Eastern Europe after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Nicaragua after the Sandinistas, Spain after Franco, South Korea after the generals, Argentina after Galtieri.
* With our help, the Iraqi military is gaining new capabilities and new confidence with every passing month. At the time of our Fallujah operations 11 months ago, there were only a few Iraqi army battalions in combat. Today there are more than 80 Iraqi army battalions fighting the insurgency alongside our forces. Progress isn't easy, but it is steady. And no fair-minded person should ignore, deny, or dismiss the achievements of the Iraqi people. *
On the other hand Pentagon officials told Congress last week that only one of Iraq's 100 battalions is able to fight without U.S. support. The top U.S. commander in Iraq, General George Casey, has admitted that the number is down from three battalions, supposedly because standards for the highest readiness rating have become more rigorous during the past few months.
* Some observers question the durability of democracy in Iraq. They underestimate the power and appeal of freedom. We've heard it suggested that Iraq's democracy must be on shaky ground because Iraqis are arguing with each other. But that's the essence of democracy: making your case, debating with those who you disagree -- who disagree, building consensus by persuasion, and answering to the will of the people.*
Really problematic for the United States is not the area of disagreement among Iraqis but a key point on which they agree: that Islam is to be the foundation for all laws, and that any proposal that contradicts Islamic religious teachings will be removed from the statute book. "Islam is a main source for legislation and it is not permitted to legislate anything that conflicts with the fixed principles of the rules of Islam," the draft states, and these principles are reported to have been approved by American diplomats in Baghdad. This may reflect excessive eagerness in Washington to maintain some momentum on the political front, at a time when large areas of Iraq remain affected by an open-ended guerrilla insurgency. Nevertheless, the Administration's acceptance that Islam is to be the foundation of Iraq's democracy is light years away from the concept of "spreading democracy in the Middle East" that has been used as a justification for t
he war in Iraq. Its ultimate fruit m!
ay well be an Iraq that is more implacably detrimental to the interests of the United States than Saddam's regime had ever been.
* Some observers also claim that America would be better off by cutting our losses and leaving Iraq now. This is a dangerous illusion, refuted with a simple question: Would the United States and other free nations be more safe, or less safe, with Zarqawi and bin Laden in control of Iraq, its people, and its resources? Having removed a dictator who hated free peoples, we will not stand by as a new set of killers, dedicated to the destruction of our own country, seizes control of Iraq by violence. *
There is another way, but it requires patience, creativity and skill: to try and create a split within the ranks of Iraqi insurgents between those who are driven primarily by nationalist and tribal motives, and people like Zarqawi who don't give a hoot for Iraq as such but simply want to use it as an episode in the global anti-American jihad. Establishing a working rapport with alienated secular-minded Sunni leaders demands overcoming distaste for a dialogue with former Baathists and Saddam loyalists. They may be tainted, but a truce and a deal with them is possible, while with the jihadist hard core it is not. "Nationalism" is not the problem, compared to jihad it is the solution. The deal with them could contain the promise of amnesty and a timetable for U.S. disengagement clearly predicated on improved security situation. American troops could then be gradually replaced with the contingents from those few relatively reliable partners we have in the regio
n, notably Egypt a!
nd Jordan.
* There's always a temptation, in the middle of a long struggle, to seek the quiet life, to escape the duties and problems of the world, and to hope the enemy grows weary of fanaticism and tired of murder. This would be a pleasant world, but it's not the world we live in. *
No such temptation will ever bother Mr. Bush's neoconservative advisors, however. Their view of America as a hybrid, "imagined" nation and a pliable tool of their global design demands constant, neurotic activity. A psychotic quest for dominance is their driving force and the "nationalist" discourse is merely its justification. Bill Kristol's "national greatness" psychosis seeks to create an eminently unpleasant world, and right now it is the world we live in.
* This enemy considers every retreat of the civilized world as an invitation to greater violence. In Iraq, there is no peace without victory. We will keep our nerve and we will win that victory. *
Yet again Mr. Bush is trying a bit too hard to place Iraq in the context of the war against terorrism, by referring to the "enemy" (terrorists) and the "victory" (in Iraq). This is mendacious, let it be said one more time, for three reasons: Saddam was not connected to the groups that have attacked or plan to attack the United States; those who wanted to attack Iraq had wanted to do so for years before 9-11; and the consequences of the Iraqi war are deeply detrimental to the global anti-terrorist struggle. His insistence that the war in Iraq was inseparable from the "war on terrorism" was a belated substitute for the discredited claim that Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction" justified military action. Both justifications were not based on fact, and both claims originally emanated from the same source. The Project for a New American Century (PNAC).
* The fifth element of our strategy in the war on terror is to deny the militants future recruits by replacing hatred and resentment with democracy and hope across the broader Middle East.*
Mr. Bush's continuing insistence on effecting the democratic transformation of the Middle East is unattainable in practice and counter-productive in principle. In practical terms, the continuing occupation of Iraq makes the United States more thoroughly disliked, throughout the Arab world, than at any time in living memory. For that reason the classic Catch-22 of nation-building in general applies even more drastically to America's position in the Middle East today: whatever its wishes, the locals will want more of the opposite. Whoever its candidate or political force of American choice, the "street" will reject them the moment it becomes aware of the connection. In principle, even if "exporting democracy" could be developed into a workable scenario, the end result would be detrimental to U.S. security. Instead of the degenerate and scared royal kleptocrats, Usama's followers would run Saudi Arabia. Iraq would - nay, will R
11; be ruled by Shi'ite clerics. Mubaraq would be swep!
t from power and the Muslim Brotherhood would turn Egypt into an Islamic Republic. In Algeria immediately, Morocco after a while, and eventually even Turkey, the survival of moderate and pro-Western regimes would be undermined. Mr. Bush's desire that the Middle East grows in democracy would benefit those who would never thank him for making their rise to power possible. But more serious yet is his often repeated but mistaken assertion of Islam's compatibility with democratic rule. Islam condemns as rebellion against Allah's supremacy the submission to any other form of law other than Shari'a. It is noteworthy that the term "democracy" did not have an equivalent in any Muslim language until a century ago. Its fundamental principle, equality, is equally absent from the Muslim vocabulary.
* America is making this stand in practical ways. We're encouraging our friends in the Middle East, including Egypt and Saudi Arabia, to take the path of reform, to strengthen their own societies in the fight against terror by respecting the rights and choices of their own people. *
On present form any attempt to democratize countries such as Saudi Arabia will not play into the hands of America's would-be friends and allies, but into the hands of Usama Bin Laden and his sympathizers. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia admittedly needs to be brought to heel. It is the most intolerant Islamic regime on the face of the earth. For decades it has been waging a worldwide proxy war against Christianity and other religions that Islam comes into contact with, like Judaism in Israel, Hinduism in India, animism in Africa, and Buddhism in Southeast Asia. Its authorities have allowed thousands of young Saudis easy access to American visas, including many bent on waging jihad against the unbelievers. America should stop pandering to Saudi whims, including the non-existent and unreciprocated "right" of its government to bankroll thousands of mosques and Islamic centers all over the Western world that teach hate and provide the logistic infrastructure to Isl
amic terrorism. Th!
e Saudi regime may well be unsustainable in the long term, but a "democratic" alternative that would quickly turn into something akin to Tehran in 1979 cannot be contemplated with equanimity. Its carefully devised incremental change should be managed now, or observed with powerless chagrin later.
* As we do our part to confront radicalism, we know that the most vital work will be done within the Islamic world, itself. And this work has begun. Many Muslim scholars have already publicly condemned terrorism, often citing Chapter 5, Verse 32 of the Koran, which states that killing an innocent human being is like killing all humanity, and saving the life of one person is like saving all of humanity. *
Mr. Bush's Kuranic quote was a distortion of verse 5:32, which states that "if anyone slew a person - unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land [emphasis added] - it would be as if he slew the whole people." Immediately thereafter follows a list of horrid torments for those who create "mischief," including death by crucifixion. That loophole embraces all those who resist the establishment of the Muslim rule or who disobey the sharia once it is established. Furthermore, Mr. Bush should be told that one single Kuranic verse, "the Verse of the Sword" (9:5) - which gives the infidel the choice between conversion or death - abrogates all 124 earlier verses, the ones that are quoted most regularly by Islam's apologists to prove its tolerance and benevolence.
* After the attacks in London on July the 7th, an imam in the United Arab Emirates declared, "Whoever does such a thing is not a Muslim, nor a religious person." *
Usama and his followers may differ from other Muslims in the exact command for action that they derive from the Kuran and the hadith, but they all speak the same language, literally as well as legally and theologically. . The gap between the pillars of respected "mainstream" Islamic thought at Cairo's Al-Azhar University and "the Evil" of 9-11 does not compare to the gap between Pope Benedict and Eric Rudolph, but merely to that between Vladimir Ilich Lenin and Pol Pot.
* The time has come for all responsible Islamic leaders to join in denouncing an ideology that exploits Islam for political ends, and defiles a noble faith. *
It is unclear whether, when, where, and how, a reformed variety of Islam desired by Mr. Bush can emerge. Presumably it would need to be capable of reinterpreting jihad, sharia, etc. and developing the "new Islamic interpretations" that the 9-11 Commission also called for. The problem is that it has been tried before. Attempts to reformulate the doctrine of jihad in particular are not new, but they have failed because they opposed centuries of orthodoxy. The willingness of a few to become what are objectively bad Muslims, because they are willing to reject discriminatory and offensive tenets of historical Islam, may be laudable in human terms but it will do nothing to modify Islam as a doctrine. A reformed faith that should question the divine authority on which the institutions of Islam rest, or attempt by rationalistic selection or abatement to effect a change, would be Islam no longer. For the majority of Muslims, any such attempt will smack of heresy. To them
, it is not !
the jihadists who are "distorting" Islam; the would-be reformers are. Until the petrodollars support a comprehensive and explicit Kuranic revisionism capable of growing popular roots, we should seek ways to defend ourselves by disengaging from the world of Islam, physically and figuratively.
* With the rise of a deadly enemy and the unfolding of a global ideological struggle, our time in history will be remembered for new challenges and unprecedented dangers. *
The unprecedented danger is for us to forget that we are heirs to the greatest and best civilization the world has known, and that our inheritance is under threat. With that threat - with Islam, that is, and not some allegedly aberrant version of it - there will be no grand synthesis, no civilizational cross-fertilization. It's kto-kogo: either Islam gets Europeanized, or Europe gets Islamized. As things stand now the outcome is uncertain. All will be lost if our future, and that of our heirs, remains in the hands of people who do not understand the nature, complexity and magnitude of the challenge.
Dr. S. Trifkovic, Foreign Affairs Editor
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